A Weekend of Southern Comfort Food

We spent the entire weekend at home, and ate nothing but Southern comfort food.  When we were planning our weekend menu, our wheels would not stop turning.  We ended up making a bunch of delicious dishes we'd never made before, and a some old standbys.  We got started on Friday evening after hitting the grocery store.

First up was chicken-fried steak, with mashed potatoes and red-eye gravy.  We had roasted okra on the side.

This was our first time cooking both chicken-fried steak and okra, and both turned out really well.  Okra is delicious!

On Saturday morning we were up bright and early.  We made buttermilk biscuits and sausage gravy for breakfast.

Our friends Jessie and Chris gave us a bunch of tomatoes recently, and we used some of the green ones to make an afternoon snack of fried green tomatoes.

They were tasty dipped in the Cajun sauce that Christopher threw together.

Dinner on Saturday evening was chili with toppings, and some cornbread that we had made earlier in the day.

We froze the leftover chili and half of the cornbread to have for our lunches later this week.

This morning's breakfast was shrimp with cheesy grits.

That hearty breakfast kept us full for the whole day.  This evening we made big dinner so we'd have a meal for tonight and lunches for Monday/ Tuesday.  We had fried chicken, mac and cheese, baked beans, bacon-bourbon coleslaw, and cornbread.

#mealprepsunday Hahaha!

And if that wasn't enough food and cooking for one weekend, we also made bananas foster for dessert.

Believe it or not, we didn't just get fat cook and eat all weekend.  We also managed to sneak in three or four movies, hours of reading, and a whole lot of relaxing. 

How was your weekend?  What did you do?  

Did you have any comfort food this weekend?

Easiest Mac and Cheese & Backyard Cooking

We made some of the easiest, tastiest mac and cheese ever this week.  Forget making a roux; you can totally skip that step.  This is a pretty high fat, cheesy dish, so you might not want it as a main course, but instead as a side dish.

That being said, we had it as a main course.  We're really wild like that.

Easiest Baked Mac and Cheese

(serves 4-6 as a side dish)

1 1/2 cups macaroni noodles (or mini shells)
1 cup shredded cheddar
1 cup shredded swiss
1/3 cup Parmesan (*set aside some of the cheese to top the dish with)
1 cup milk
1/3 cup sour cream (or mayo)
2 T butter
1 T flour
1/2 tsp dijon mustard
1/2 tsp hot sauce
1/2 tsp sea or kosher salt

Cook the pasta according to the package directions.  Drain.  Return noodles to the pot.  Add everything else and stir over the heat until combined.  Pour into a buttered baking dish.  Top with more cheese if desired.  Bake at 400 F for 20 minutes, then broil for about 2 minutes.

We ate a small portion each, and topped it with some roasted veggies.

The leftovers were great warmed up the next day.

Last night we sat outside, listened to tunes, visited, and cooked meatballs and potatoes on the BBQ.  We had never cooked meatballs on the BBQ before, but I bought this cool contraption from Williams Sonoma years ago, and wanted to finally try it out.

We were really impressed with how well it worked!  The meatballs were perfect.  They held together really well, and cooked very evenly.

This weekend we are looking forward to relaxing in our backyard.  We'd much rather hang out on our own deck than go out to a restaurant or pub patio.  When we got groceries yesterday for the weekend and week ahead, we only bought stuff to BBQ.  We'll be taking full advantage of the beautiful weather by cooking outside all week.

What are you up to this weekend?  What's the weirdest thing you've ever cooked on the BBQ?